hunger to be heard: interview with a homicide grief counselor
by judith toy

We are committed to finding ways, including personal contact, images, and sounds, to be with those who suffer, so we can understand their situation deeply and help them transform their suffering into compassion, peace, and joy.
Thich Nhat Hanh

It is May. We are sitting on a bench in Rose Sierra’s pure land on the edge of a clear, rushing stream in a circle of tulip poplars, gazing at the water. The rhododendrons have become a rain forest this spring, the forest floor sprouting ferns, the atmosphere rich with iridescentdragonflies, jewelweed and thrushes. In this magical Appalachian setting, rare white squirrels live and show off their antics. It is hard to concentrate on the topic of murder for all the lush distractions of life in the woods.

“I worked one year of intense homicide grief counseling in Tucson, for a homicide survivors’ group which began as Parents of Murdered Children,” says Rose, a petite woman with a shock of dark hair, an ageless face and deep, deep blue eyes. “It was a drop-in group, with anywhere from six to 25 people—parents of murdered children, spouses, and friends.”

“How did you cope with the intensity of counseling those who have lost family members to murder?”

“At first I felt murder was contagious. After the group, I’d run home and lock all my doors. I had bad dreams. At parties, people reacted to me by not wanting to talk about my work. Some people believe that as they think so will they live—that their thoughts or conversations will come true.

“Some didn’t want to hear the stories, didn’t want to let me process what I was feeling. I had one friend, a friend of 20 years who vowed when I started this work, ‘I’ll be here for you.’ Well, it just didn’t happen. I called and left message after message. Sadly, our friendship ended.”

“So you would say that murder is one of our cultural hot buttons?”

“Definitely. Yet offering this counseling to the families of murder victims changed my life. Prior to this experience, I perceived myself as sensitive and fragile, afraid of stepping onto an airplane, afraid of violence of any kind.

“By sitting in the group over time, I felt my heart torn open (Rose makes a motion as if to rend her breastbone in two) It felt literal. I was completely committed to opening myself, to becoming the Jungian container.”

Rose reminds me that my own first Zen teacher called me a wide-mouthed vessel, meaning teachable, ready.

“If you were feeling so torn, how did you manage to hold a calm space to contain the grief of others?”

“I brought myself to the place where members of the group could be completely heard, without judgment or suggestions or advice. I knew that there was no part of me that could shut out their stories.

“Everyone hungers for that—to be heard and seen at that profound level. I would literally feel this knot in my chest. Then I’d get in the car and sob all the way home. Tears would come within the group, too. But driving home alone on the empty streets of Tucson, I would completely let go—sobbing, even screaming sometimes.

“I started as a more fearful person and came out of that experience transformed. I forgot to be scared of flying. It was like I’d been exposed to my worst fear even though I didn’t have to have the thing happen to me.”

“What would you say is the kernel of your discovery?”

“I found out that I was much stronger than I’d any idea I was—to be there at that tragic level of grief—for others. And it changedeverything about me to the core. It changed my identity.

“When people take ropes courses, the object is to transfer that level of courage into their work life. Leading that group for a year was my ropes course. It overflowed into my life. I’m so grateful.”

I, too, felt transformed after the brutal, random murders of three of my family—my first husband’s sister and our two teenaged nephews. Out of desperation, I, like Rose, became teachable. Friends took my hand and ledme to what in Zen we call a Dharma door, a door of opportunity. I chose to walk through that door. Following five years of daily meditationpractice, I was able to forgive the perpetrator. This did not meanexcusing the act in any way.

“Rose, I want to know, did any of your clients come to the point of forgiveness?”

“What they sought,” she tells me, “was permission not to forgive. They didn’t want to be overlaid with notions of mandatory mercy. They needed the freedom to feel whatever they were feeling. Often they wanted to see the murderer dead so that no one else would be hurt.”

I think to myself, what if the victim were my child?

Concerning the death penalty, Rose believes it morally wrong to kill, period. But now she carries with her a deep understanding that homicide survivors seek capital punishment not for revenge, but for safety--their own and others’, since killers often get out of jail.

In Zen, we learn there is no self and other. If this is so, I am left with the question, how can we come face to face with the murderer as well as the counselor in each of us? As the afternoon shadows lengthen in Rose’s garden, this safe place, I wonder how separate we are from these people we deem monsters—how separate from the saintly, the wise?

Judith Toy is a poet, writing tutor and zen practitioner. She and her husband host Cloud Cottage Sangha in Black Mountain, a mindfulnesscommunity inspired by the teachings of Zen master Thich Nhat Hanh. This is an excerpt from her book-in-progress, Sitting on Fire, the Zen of Forgiveness, stemming from the tragic triple murder in her family in October, 1990. Toy leads days of mindfulness on the topic of forgiveness.[ 828-669-0920 or pjtoy@juno.com]

Rose Sierra is a personal coach and counselor in Asheville, NorthCarolina. [ 828-696-2921; rose@rsierra.net ]